This is a small poetry club that started as a poetry email exchange between two friends. Our goal is to read a poem everyday, and this blog is one way to help keep us accountable. There is only one valid rule in poetry club: there are no rules in poetry club. Read any poem, in any order, with any or no interactions. You decide. We only suggest you read poetry!
10 Oct: "We Real Cool" by Gwendolyn Brooks
The pool players, seven at the Golden Shovel.
We real cool. We
Left school. We
Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We
Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We
Jazz June. We
Die soon.
We, we, we... Is being cool worth an early death? All these fun things, dropping out of school, hanging around the clubs, drinking, etc, are they really cool? Is dying young cool? The poem questions these choices. The problem is the young people making these choices, like leaving school, have undeveloped brains that are not ready to make weigh the consequences of their actions.
The alliteration, repetition, and rhyme make it a very pleasant read although the content is not so pleasant.
We, we, we... Is being cool worth an early death? All these fun things, dropping out of school, hanging around the clubs, drinking, etc, are they really cool? Is dying young cool? The poem questions these choices. The problem is the young people making these choices, like leaving school, have undeveloped brains that are not ready to make weigh the consequences of their actions.
ReplyDeleteThe alliteration, repetition, and rhyme make it a very pleasant read although the content is not so pleasant.